[svlug] Newbie Linux question

[Joe Buck]

On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 01:22:55PM -0800, Chris Miller wrote:
> On 2/2/07, Joe Buck <Joe.Buck at synopsys.com> wrote:
> >On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 11:39:03AM -0800, Paul Reiber wrote:
> >> You didn't say if you'd settled on a particular version of Linux to start
> >> from, so I'll put in a hearty recommendation for using Ubuntu linux.
> >> I've seen it work flawlessly "from install forward" considerably more
> >> often than any other distro.
> >
> >Ubuntu is a good choice for beginners.  My only caveat is that it lags
> >on wireless support.  For wireless, you'll do better with Fedora Core 6,
> >especially if you have to deal with WPA or a wireless chip type that
> >was only recently added to the kernel (e.g. Broadcom).
> 
> I contest that.  My experience has been the exact opposite.  The
> network support you're talking about in FC6 is facilitated by the
> network-manager-gnome (and network-manager) packages.  By installing
> those in Ubuntu ...

... as opposed to having them just come up, installed and ready to go, by
default?

> ...  However, that can be fixed by adding a unstable repo,
> or you can take an easier path and just compile your own kernel from
> sources.

Sigh.  For the knowledgeable person able to install from alternative
repositories and recompile the kernel, all distros are basically equal,
because you can work around any missing feature in the one you choose.

But we were talking about new users here.  Certainly for a new user who's
a friend of yours, I'm sure that you could provide a good setup based on
Ubuntu, Fedora, or anything else.